FIG. 1 is illustrative of the prior techniques of running in casing with a casing shoe 16 near its lower end. If later a tubular is run in and needs to be attached to the casing by expansion, the presence of cement debris in the support area on the casing where the tubular will be attached could prevent a sealed connection from being obtained. One way around that would be to deliver the cement into a shoe mounted below the point at which the liner will be attached later. Another method would be to run brushes and scrapers into the mounting location after cementing to be sure it was clean so that a good seal and support for the tubular subsequently installed can be obtained. However these techniques require significant amounts of time and create an associated cost.
The present invention protects the mounting location on the casing during cementing with a sleeve that covers a recess. The sleeve defines a sealed annular space that contains an incompressible material. This allows the sleeve to be compliant to changes in hydrostatic pressure as the casing is lowered into place. Cementing is done through the sleeve. The sleeve is subsequently drilled out exposing a recess and a locating groove. The tubular can then be positioned accurately and expanded in to sealing contact with the casing. Due to the recess, the drift diameter of the tubular after expansion into the recess is at least as large as the casing drift diameter. The entire tubular can be expanded to its lower end and a run in shoe at the lower end of the tubular can be retrieved and removed from the well with the swaging assembly and the running string that delivered it. These advantages and others of the present invention will be readily appreciated by those skilled in the art from a review of the description of the preferred embodiment and the claims that appear below.